 | Oldtown folks |  |
PREFACE.
GENTLE READER, — It is customary to omit prefaces.
I beg you to make an exception in my particular
case; I have something I really want to say. I
have an object in this book, more than the mere telling
of a story, and you can always judge of a book better
if you compare it with the author's object. My object
is to interpret to the world the New England life and
character in that particular time of its history which
may be called the seminal period. I would endeavor
to show you New England in its seed-bed, before the
hot suns of modern progress had developed its sprouting
germs into the great trees of to-day.
New England has been to these United States what
the Dorian hive was to Greece. It has always been a
capital country to emigrate from, and North, South,
East, and West have been populated largely from New
England, so that the seed-bed of New England was
the seed-bed of this great American Republic, and of
all that is likely to come of it.
New England people cannot be thus interpreted without
calling into view many grave considerations and
necessitating some serious thinking.
In doing this work, I have tried to make my mind
as still and passive as a looking-glass, or a mountain
lake, and then to give you merely the images reflected
there. I desire that you should see the characteristic
I have taken an author's liberty of explaining their
characters to you, and telling you why they talked and
lived as they did.
My studies for this object have been Pre-Raphaelite, —
taken from real characters, real scenes, and real incidents.
And some of those things in the story which may appear
most romantic and like fiction are simple renderings and
applications of facts.
Any one who may be curious enough to consult Rev.
Elias Nason's book, called “Sir Charles Henry Frankland,
or Boston in the Colonial Times,” will there see a full
description of the old manor-house which in this story is
called the Dench House. It was by that name I always
heard it spoken of in my boyhood.
In portraying the various characters which I have introduced,
I have tried to maintain the part simply of a
sympathetic spectator. I propose neither to teach nor
preach through them, any farther than any spectator of
life is preached to by what he sees of the workings of
human nature around him.
Though Calvinist, Arminian, High-Church Episcopalian,
sceptic, and simple believer all speak in their turn,
I merely listen, and endeavor to understand and faithfully
represent the inner life of each. I myself am but
the observer and reporter, seeing much, doubting much,
questioning much, and believing with all my heart in
only a very few things.
And so I take my leave of you.
| Oldtown folks | |